Directors & Boards articles from March 1992

Directors & Boards archives from March 1992

America bashing. (Letter from the Chairman)
March 22, 1992... Banner headlines trumpet the decline of U.S. economic power. According to these commentators, America is no longer competitive, as evidenced most starkly by our mountainous trade deficits, particularly with the Japanese. "The Cold War is over...

'Surprise' governance. (threats and opportunities for businesses) (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... For perhaps a decade now, business has been talking about global marketing, global finance, global operations, global strategies, and even global managers in a changing world. I have no quarrel with the word "global." My argument is with the...

The challenge of governing for value. (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... In the next five years, managers and boards will find themselves faced with new challenges from the stock market. Instead of episodic, confrontational challenges for control, CEOs and directors will find themselves subjected to continuous,...

The long and short of it. (investment decision making) (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... What exactly does drive Corporate America's investment decisionmaking, and how can its time horizons be extended? Short termism has become a widely accepted explanation of America's longterm economic difficulties. It was one of the charges...

The high cost of confrontation. (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... Thanks to distant relationships between shareowners and executives who run corporations, America has a cost-of-capital problem. Any business person who has ever tried to justify a capital expenditure to senior management is familiar with...

The buddy system. (new model for management-shareholder relations) (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... The 40-year relationship that Du Pont and GM enjoyed earlier this century this century suggests an enviable model for management-shareholder relations. Thomas A. Murphy, the former chairman of General Motors, recently wrote to a friend...

A tool to be best-in-class. (benchmarking) (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... Benchmarking is becoming an essential process for sustaining competitive advantage and surpassing the value creation of one's leading competitors. Benchmarking has been growing rapidly since the mid-1980s as a result of intensifying global...

The curse of the quarterly report. (includes related article) (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... Rather than constantly being distracted by looking at the scoreboard, we need to keep our eye on the ball instead. by Don Ritter Over the years, corporate CEOs and other executives have complained to me about the numerous deterrents they...

Executive pay and the Board: should a compensation committee have its own consultant? No. (includes related article) (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... Should a compensation committee have its own consultant? No. Should compensation committees have their own consultants? This question is increasingly being asked in the press, in boardrooms, and among institutional investors. It is being...

Due dilligence on executive pay. (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... The simple fact is that some compensation committees do need their own consultants. The clamor over the high levels of executive pay in the United States has reached its highest pitch yet. Critics in the media, academia, consulting, and...

A better approach to director pay. (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... Shareholder alignment is the goal, and that means eliminating certain fixed-cost elements and extending the use of stock options. Given all the controversy surrounding CEO pay, it is only a matter of time before significant attention is...

An audit committee for dynamic times. (Chairman's Agenda: Governing for Shareholder Prosperity)
March 22, 1992... The escalating debate on corporate governance is likely to focus even more attention on the pivotal role of audit committees. Frequent media headlines herald cases of corporate impropriety, management fraud, and the business failures of...

Appallingly common M&A mistakes. (mergers and acquisitions)
March 22, 1992... After 20 years of providing legal advice to clients involved in acquisitions, divestitures, and restructurings, I often have a feeling of deja vu. Some of these deals, unfortunately, have not been successful. But what continually amazes me is...

How investors rate executive pay.
March 22, 1992... How do institutional investors feel about executive compensation? To find out, Georgeson $ Co. conducted a survey of the 500 largest institutional investors. What follow are some of the key findings excerpted from the study. Institutional...

New directors, new opportunities.
March 22, 1992... Following is a selection of executives elected to corporate boards in the first quarter of this year. Lindsay Edward Fox purchased his first truck at the age of 16. Today, the Linfox Group, of which he is chairman, is one of the largest...

Martin F.C. Emmett, Tambrands Inc.. (includes related article) (Interview)
March 22, 1992... In the spring of 1989, Tambrands Inc. was a company a drift. The maker of personal care products - whose dominant brand is the Tampax tampon - was suffering from lackluster performance, a disappointing diversification strategy, and the sudden...